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The Commerce Clause of the US Constitution

Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution gives Congress the power "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes." This clause is commonly referred to as "The Commerce Clause."

Interpretations of the Commerce Clause have differed significantly since the ratification of the Constitution. Conservative and libertarian legal experts interpret this clause from an originalist viewpoint, arguing that the power to "regulate" is actually the power to "make regular." Under this interpretation, the Commerce Clause was put into the Constitution to give the federal government the power to prevent states from erecting barriers to commerce against each other, such as leveling tariffs on goods from other states, or forbidding interstate exchange all together. Essentially, the originalists argue that the Framers wanted to ensure domestic free trade in America.

Progressives (and many neo-conservatives) tend to ignore historical arguments and rely on past Supreme Court interpretations of the Commerce Clause. One of the most cited cases is Wickard v. Filburn (1942). In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that the Commerce Clause gives Congress the right to regulate any economic activity that has substantial effect (in the aggregate) on interstate commerce.

Recently, the Commerce Clause has received revived attention in determining the constitutional basis for the "individual mandate" portion of the Obama Administration's new health care reform law, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (colloquially known as "Obamacare"). The individual mandate would require all citizens to purchase health insurance, and those who do not purchase insurance would have to pay a penalty.

This interpretation has come under heavy criticism, and was even struck down as unconstitutional by two federal judges. Critics of Obamacare's individual mandate maintain that Congress does not not have the authority to punish people who choose not to purchase medical insurance. They point out that the act of not buying something cannot be construed as commerce or economic activity at all, and is therefore not subject to congressional regulation. However, three other federal judges upheld the individual mandate as constitutional under the Commerce Clause. They argued that because uninsured medical patients have a right to receive emergency medical care, regardless of their ability to pay, the choice to opt out of purchasing health insurance has a substantial effect on health care costs, and is thus subject to regulation under the Commerce Clause. It is widely believed that the U.S. Supreme Court will eventually make a decision on the constitutionality of Obamacare and its individual mandate, and in doing so, will drastically affect how the Commerce Clause is interpreted in the near future.

This topic page will help you understand the historical background and the current debate regarding the Commerce Clause. It contains discussions of the varying interpretations and analysis of how they have affected the growth of government regulation in the economy.

"What can Congress do that the Supreme Court would find unconstitutional? Or, what can Congress do that a president would veto as unconstitutional? It is not much exaggeration to say that Congress can do whatever it can muster a majority vote for, whether it is constitutional or not. The members only have to worry about...

"Is Congress going through the ordeal of trying to enact health-care reform only to have one of the main pillars--requiring individuals to obtain insurance--declared unconstitutional? An interesting debate for a constitutional law seminar. In the real world, not a big worry.

"Most of us recall from our civics classes the quaint notion that our federal government is one of 'limited' and 'enumerated' powers. We might also remember that James Madison, in his Federalist No. 45, assured skeptics of a central government that '[t]he powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Federal...

"The Supreme Court confirmation hearings for Elena Kagan provided key exchanges about the Commerce Clause, natural rights, and other issues that have convinced me to vote against her nomination. Based on her own testimony, she'll violate her oath as soon as she's sworn in.

Despite a few recent rulings declaring the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act unconstitutional, Ian Millhiser insists that the Act is not outside constitutional bounds. Millhiser argues that Congress has power to tax, "regulate the...

"Last week the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Comstock et al. that Congress has the constitutional authority to empower federal district courts to civilly commit dangerous sex offenders who had completed their sentences. In effect, the courts can mandate indefinite confinement...

"The hottest ticket in Washington last week was to the Supreme Court, where seats had long been 'sold out' to hear oral argument in the case of United States v. Morrison. At issue is the constitutionality of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), which alone would explain the interest. But those focused on the feminist angle are missing the main event. At bottom,...

"Those opposing health care reform are increasingly relying on an argument that has no legal merit: that the health care reform legislation would be unconstitutional. There is, of course, much to debate about how to best reform America's health care system. But there is no doubt that bills passed by House and Senate committees are constitutional.

"Last week, I asked South Carolina Congressman James Clyburn, the third-ranking Democrat in the House of Representatives, where in the Constitution it authorizes the federal government to regulate the delivery of health care. He replied: 'There's nothing in the Constitution that says that the federal government has anything to do with most of the stuff we do.' Then...

"The Supreme Court's recent decision saying that the federal government can prosecute those using marijuana for medical purposes, even when state laws permit such use, has been seen by many as an issue of being for or against marijuana. But the real significance of this decision has little to do with marijuana and everything to do with the kind of government that...

"Did you know that a federal judge has handed down a ruling on health reform saying the new legislation is not only constitutional, but also effectively says that your thought processes, which lead to your choices, can now be regulated by the federal government?

"Supposing for the moment that we thought it were a good idea on policy grounds, would it be within the power of Congress to set ground rules for online advertisers who gather personal data from Web browsers? Recall that there are two particular rules that I've said I'd be tentatively open to, but which Jim rejects: a requirement of notice when information is being...

"As the challenge to Obamacare's constitutionality approaches the Supreme Court, the question on everyone's mind is: How will Anthony Kennedy vote? But perhaps we should also ask: How will Antonin Scalia vote? Scalia is known as one of the Court's most conservative justices, but a concurrence he wrote in a 2005 case should give opponents of the health-care law...

"Maybe it was a matter of timing (Monica's book was just hitting the stands), but when a federal appeals court declared the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) unconstitutional last week it didn't get much attention. In fact, it may be the most important court case this year, because it sharply limits the ability of Congress to create categories of lawsuits....

"Remember when the Commerce Clause challenge to the individual insurance mandate was dismissed by all serious and knowledgeable constitutional law professors and Nancy Pelosi as 'frivolous'? Well, as Jonathan notes below, the administration is now apparently telling the New York Times that the individual insurance 'requirement' and 'penalty' is really an exercise...

"In 2005 the Supreme Court said the federal government's power to 'regulate commerce…among the several states' extends to the tiniest speck of marijuana wherever it may be found, even in the home of a patient who grows it for her own medical use in compliance with state law. 'If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause,' Justice Clarence Thomas warned...

"Last night's passage of the greatest expansion of the federal government since the Great Society is a sad day for our country, not only because it may bankrupt our future, but also because we have no recourse to the Constitution. Our Constitution was elegantly designed to protect individuals from too much concentration of power in any one source, but the Supreme...

"In 1990, the U.S. Congress passed a law forbidding possession of a firearm within 1,000 feet of any school. The Gun-Free School Zones Act was touted as a blow on behalf of education and against violence among children. Two years later, Alfonso Lopez Jr., a 12th-grader at Edison High School in San Antonio, Texas, carried a concealed .38-caliber pistol to school....

"Once President Barack Obama and Democrats in Congress have passed a health care reform bill, conservative groups are likely to challenge parts of it as unconstitutional, arguing that it oversteps Congress's powers. A key target will be the individual mandate, which is designed to coax uninsured persons into purchasing insurance.

"James Madison once described the judiciary as 'an impenetrable bulwark against every assumption of power in the legislative or executive.' Had he lived to see the Supreme Court's sweeping definition of congressional power under the Commerce Clause, he might have revised that statement."

"The verdict in Gonzales v. Raich last week was a stunning victory for federal power, and it came with an unusual endorsement. The Court upheld Drug Enforcement Agency prosecution of sick women who use medical marijuana to treat symptoms of their illnesses. Siding with the DEA, six justices held that the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution (which gives the...

"Two federal district court judges have ruled that Congress exceeded its constitutional authority under the U.S. Constitution's commerce clause when it included the so-called individual mandate in the recent health-care act.

That makes the score on this issue among district court judges 3-2 in favor of the mandate. Given the...

Randy E. Barnett analyzes the original intent behind the word "commerce" and seeks to understand whether the Founders meant it as "any gainful activity" or in the narrower sense of only "buying and selling." Barnett concludes that the Founders, in the Constitutional Convention and the Ratification Debates, only meant it in the narrow sense.

"Contemporary originalist readings have tended to view the commerce power through modern eyes. Originalists defending narrow readings of federal power have identified 'commerce' with the trade of commodities; originalists defending broad readings of federal power have identified 'commerce' with all gainful economic activity."

"Jack Balkin's article Commerce fails to consider the full range of evidence and thereby attributes to the Constitution's Commerce Clause a scope that virtually no one in the Founding Era believed it had."

"In recent years, the Supreme Court has for the first time since the New Deal begun to rein in Congress’s power under the commerce clause. While such developments are welcome, Congress, as a co-equal branch of government, need not take its cues from the Supreme Court and should take the lead in restoring its own limits to the commerce power."

"Last spring the U.S. Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional a key section of the 1994 Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). That section allowed a victim of rape or other violence 'motivated by gender' to sue the perpetrator for civil damages in federal court for violating her civil rights."

"At bottom, then, Lopez is not about gun control or even about federal-state relations but about whether the Court is ready to hold Congress to its constitutional limits. The Court should. For if the enumerated powers doctrine is in fact dead, other constitutional protections are in jeopardy as well."

"Unsure about the scope of the federal commerce power and, accordingly, the appropriate limits on state interference with interstate commerce, the courts, executives, and legislatures, at the federal and state level alike, are often at a loss about how to approach the problem."

"The Court's opinion in United States v. Lopez sent shock waves through official Washington, not least because Washington had simply assumed, since the era of the New Deal, that its regulatory powers were plenary."

As part of his analysis, Roland points out that the meanings of words such as "commerce" or "regulate" did not have the same meaning in the 18th century as they do today, thus concluding that the Founders never intended for the Commerce Clause (Article I, Section 8) to be interpreted as broadly as it is today.

"The Supreme Court's modern interpretation of the Necessary and Proper Clause in the realm of interstate commerce is textually problematic, unfaithful to the Constitution's original meaning, and contains positive incentives for Congress to over-regulate."

"Through this new understanding of the power of the commerce clause, 20th century America sees unprecedented growth in federal regulation and criminalization on numerous fronts of civil society. This understanding continued until about 1995, when the Supreme Court struck down the Gun Free School Zones Act as unconstitutional."

"Starting in 2014, the recently enacted Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA, P.L. 111-148) will require most U.S. residents to purchase health insurance or pay a financial 'penalty' to the government. This provision, popularly called the individual mandate, is the linchpin of some of the PPACA's most significant reforms."

"In the original debates over adoption of the Constitution, 'regulation of commerce' was used, almost exclusively, as a cover of words for specific mercantilist proposals related to deep-water shipping and foreign trade."

"The federal government was supposed to be limited to a few defined powers. The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution—'The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people'—confirms it."

"If Obamacare can mandate the purchase of health insurance, could it in theory also mandate the purchase of broccoli?" That's the question up being asked in this debate between Ilya Shapiro from the Cato Institute and Mark Hall from Wake Forest University.

This podcast discusses the Commerce Clause and Obamacare and whether or not the latter's individual mandate is constitutional. To paraphrase Robert Levy, this is the first time that the government has mandated the purchase of anything, and if they can do it in one place, they can do it anywhere.

"Wine wholesalers say an epidemic of alcohol awaits if the U.S. allows for the deregulation of wine distribution. But there's no reason, constitutional or otherwise, for wholesalers to maintain a death-grip on the movement of booze from one place to another. Ilya Shapiro, senior fellow of Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute offers his thoughts."

"At the heart of the case against ObamaCare is the assertion that it's a violation of the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which is supposed to allow the federal government to assure that commerce is regular. So why do so many conservatives believe that the commerce clause must be reigned in for ObamaCare, but viewed expansively when it comes to states setting...

In this video, conservative pundit Ann Coulter weighs in on the individual mandate portion of "Obamacare" in her usual inflammatory style. She argues that if the commerce clause does indeed give Congress the authority to mandate that people purchase health insurance, Republicans should also mandate gun and Bible ownership as well.

"Recently, Kathleen Sebelius spoke at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. When asked by a CNSNews.com correspondent where does the government get the power to mandate that the Americans purchase health insurance, her response was 'I am not a lawyer' and plans to leave that up to the Department of Justice (DOJ)."

"The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) has set forth an individual mandate that requires all Americans to have health insurance. The justification for the law rests on the idea developed since the New Deal in the 1930s that any economic activity an individual engages in could impact the national economy and therefore can be regulated by the Federal Government based on its...

"The individual mandate in ObamaCare represents a dramatic and unprecedented expansion of federal power. Randy Barnett, Cato Institute Senior fellow and a constitutional law professor at the Georgetown University Law Center, argues on C-SPAN that the Commerce Clause grants the federal government no such authority."

In this video, Roger Pilon, Director of the Center for Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute, discusses the Interstate Commerce Clause with Judge Andrew Napolitano on the television show "Freedom Watch."

According to this video, one of the leading challenges of Obamacare has to do with the individual mandate and its relation to the Commerce Clause in the Constitution. This video describes the background of the Commerce Clause and whether or not the Obamacare law violates the Clause.

This case from 1935 marks one of the many times that the Supreme Court struck down New Deal legislation, this time dealing with the National Industrial Recovery act. The court ruled unanimously that the provisions of federal regulation authorized in this law were unconstitutional, as the Commerce Clause did not provide Congress with the power to regulate price and...

"In his piercing introduction to An Economic Interpretation the author wrote that 'whoever leaves economic pressures out of history or out of discussion of public questions is in mortal peril of substituting mythology for reality.' It was Beard's view that the founding fathers, especially Madison, Jay, and Hamilton, never made such a miscalculation. Indeed, these statesmen placed...

This case centered around two facets of the Constitution: the Commerce Clause and the regulation of taxes on imports. Chief Justice Marshall offered the opinion of the Court in this case, concluding with following statement:

"It has been contended that this construction of the power to regulate commerce, as was contended in construing the prohibition to...

James Kent was an American legal scholar. Widely popular, his Commentaries consist of a series of lectures on the history of law, the American Constitution, federal and municipal law, and laws concerning persons and property.

“In this case, the Commonwealth of Virginia …, through its Attorney General, challenges the constitutionality of the pivotal enforcement mechanism of the health care scheme adopted by Congress in the Patient Protection...

"We may summarize our view of constitutional government by saying that its ultimate and essential objects are:

1st. To bring the active and planning will of each part of the government into accord with the prevailing popular thought and need, in order that government may be the impartial instrument of a symmetrical national...

In this piece, Alexander Hamilton discusses the concept of trade regulation. Hamilton argues that the power to regulate trade should be held by Congress and the federal government. This treatise was written before the Constitution was adopted as the supreme law of the land, so it provides some historical insight into the arguments used by supporters of a federal...

The case of Corfield v. Coryell revolved around the issue of whether or not a certain vessel was at fault for taking oysters from an alleged New Jersey river. Among other things, it was argued that the detainment of the vessel was a violation of the...

Gibbons v. Ogden is considered a landmark supreme court case on the issue of the Interstate Commerce Clause. Aaron Ogden was given an exclusive license to operate a shipping business within the State of New York. He sued a man named Thomas Gibbons, who ran a competing shipping business between New Jersey and New York City, claiming that Gibbon's operations in the...

This Supreme Court case deals with how the Commerce Clause gives the federal government the right to criminalize the growing and personal usage of marijuana, even when these actions are in accordance to state law.

California's Compassionate Use Act allows people to use limited amounts of marijuana for strictly medicinal...

Heart of Atlanta Motel was a motel in Atlanta, Georgia that would not rent rooms to black men and women. When the Civil Rights Act was passed, the owner of the motel sued, arguing that Congress did not have the right to regulate his motel under the interstate commerce clause.

In this brief portion of a letter written by James Madison to Joseph Cabell, Madison discusses his own understanding of the purpose and intent of the Commerce Clause. He believed that it was primarily put into the Constitution in order to prevent the individual states from levying import duties and tariffs on each other.

This brief introduction to James Madison's arguments against the Articles of Confederation highlights the problem of the individual states levying tariffs against each other. Madison argued that because Congress did not have an overarching power to regulate commerce under the Articles of Confederation, the individual states ended up behaving like economic rivals,...

Livingston v. Van Ingen is another case which centered around the question of the Commerce Clause and the rights it does or does not grant to Congress. In general, the opinion of this court is that Congress has a right to regulate "external" commerce and that...

This case effectively marked the end of the Supreme Court's resistance to FDR's New Deal programs and legislation. Allegedly responding to Roosevelt's court packing threat, the Supreme Court ruled that the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (The Wagner Act) was indeed constitutional.

In the 12th chapter of the book, Construction Construed and Constitutions Vindicated, John Taylor outlines his opinions and constitutional views regarding the General Welfare and the Congressional power to regulate Commerce.

This treatise, written by the United States' first Secretary of the Treasury, shows the word "commerce" to be a synonym for "trade" and not a catch-all phrase for economic activity. Alexander Hamilton believed in a strong central government and constantly tried to expand the role of the federal government, yet he understood that the word "commerce" did not refer to...

This letter from Richard Henry Lee to an unknown source briefly outlines Lee's opposition to the idea of giving Congress the power to regulate commerce. He believes that Congress will end up taking regulatory action that damages the southern economy while bolstering the northern economy.

Describing the Commerce Clause, St. George Tucker notes that the Clause was enacted in order "to suppress those jealousies, which must inevitably have arisen among the states, had any tax or duty been laid upon any particular...

In January 2011, U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson declared that "'The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act' [is] unconstitutional." Judge Vinson's decision was carefully thought out and related to the Constitutional "Commerce Clause." Vinson also made an...

In August of 2011, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals declared that parts of the PPACA were unconstitutional. This decision addresses the constitutionality of the Individual Mandate portion of Obamacare, as well as the difference between a tax and a penalty in relation to the PPACA's implementation.

In this case the Supreme Court ruled that a meatpacking plant, as part of the "current of commerce" between states, was subject to congressional regulation. According to the Court, Congress has the power to regulate commerce even if the commerical activity is localized, so long as it could eventually become part of interstate trade.

"HAVING shown that no one of the powers transferred to the federal government is unnecessary or improper, the next question to be considered is, whether the whole mass of them will be dangerous to the portion of authority left in the several States."

The Constitution of the United States established the federal governmental system currently in place with three branches of government. The premise of executive privilege developed from the separation of powers clause.

In this treatise, Thomas Paine manifests the understanding of the word "commerce" during the time of the writing of the Constitution. To the men of this era, the word "commerce" implied trade or the buying and selling of goods; it had no logical connection to production or activity. This is best shown in the paragraph below, where Paine speaks to the strength of...

Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the majority opinion in this case, ruling that the Violence Against Women Act of 1994 was unconstitutional. This law gave victims of gender-motivated crimes the right to sue for damages in federal court. In this instance, the court ruled that the Commerce Clause and Fourteenth Amendment did not give Congress the authority to enact...

This court decision discusses Congressional boundaries in regulating U.S. commerce, particularly in relation to foreign commerce. Judge Davis seems to conclude that Congress has a perfect right to regulate commerce - if only for a short time - if...

This Supreme Court case is regarded as the case that threw open the doors of federal government regulation. Whenever the constitutional authority of Congress to regulate interstate commerce is brought up, legal scholars and analysts point to this case, which gives Congress the authority to regulate almost anything it wants to regulate.

This case revolved around the construction of a dam in the state of Delaware which was subsequently damaged by a sailing vessel. The accident caused some to suggest that Delaware had defied the Commerce Clause by building the dam. Chief Justice Marshall, however, declared...

"When the first two volumes of William Crosskey's monumental study of the Constitution appeared in 1953, Arthur M. Schlesinger called it 'perhaps the most fertile commentary on that document since The Federalist papers.' It was highly controversial as well. The work was a comprehensive reassessment of the meaning of the Constitution, based on examination...

"The U.S. Constitution found in school textbooks and under glass in Washington is not the one enforced today by the Supreme Court. In Restoring the Lost Constitution, Randy Barnett argues that since the nation's founding, but especially since the 1930s, the courts have been cutting holes in the original Constitution and its amendments to eliminate the parts that protect liberty from the power...

"Napolitano, New Jersey Superior Court Judge and analyst for Fox News, explains how the federal government has manipulated the Constitution to take power from the states and the people. Written for a general audience, Napolitano's book also includes a brief history of the founding of the United States, the Bill of Rights, the specific powers granted to Congress in...

"The United States Constitution—the bedrock of our country, the foundation of our federal republic—is...dead.

You won't hear that from the politicians who endlessly pay lip service to the Constitution. It's the dirty little secret that bestselling authors Thomas E. Woods Jr. and Kevin R. C. Gutzman expose in this provocative new...

"Cato's Center for Constitutional Studies and its scholars take their inspiration from the struggle of America's founding generation to secure liberty through limited government and the rule of law. The Center's scholars address a wide range of constitutional and legal issues and encourage the judiciary to neither make nor ignore the law but interpret and apply it through the natural rights...

This web page, provided by the University of Chicago Press and the Liberty Fund, contains a compiled list of primary documents and historical sources regarding the Commerce Clause. These primary sources include court cases from the early 19th century, as well as relevant...

At Intellectual Takeout, we think it's about time freedom went viral.
Before our generation is the opportunity to embrace freedom, to unleash each individual's potential, and to have a prosperous future. And yet it seems that almost everyone running our cities, states, and federal government is intent on destroying freedom and burying us in debt to pay for it.
If you, like us, believe that...

In the genre of documentaries revealing the problems with public education, "Kids Aren't Cars" focuses on helping us understand how schools are modeled after a factory system and what we need to do to change them. Understandably, treating kids as if they are a product to be manufactured has had detrimental effects on children going through the system and the overall level of education in America...

"Many parents and taxpayers feel helpless because the problems can seem so monumental. 'Kids Aren't Cars' director Kyle Olson reviews what he learned in the filmmaking process and the small things individuals can do that will add up to make a big difference."
Here's Kyle being interviewed on a few things you can do and share with friends, family, and educators:
Part 1Part 2

We all know Facebook is awesome for keeping up with friends, sharing about your life, and even distributing ideas. One great new way to get people thinking is to take advantage of the new banner profile with the help of Intellectual Takeout. Here's what one of our banners looks like loaded up on a Facebook profile:
If you haven't changed your banner profile, than Facebook is likely ...

Okay, so your friends and family keep telling you to jump
on the social media bandwagon, but you have no idea what the fuzz is about.
Here’s the deal: The Internet gives liberty-loving folk like
us an opportunity we have never had before: to make the case for individual
liberty, limited government and free market economics instantly and globally.
But with the vast amounts of information...

Looking for an internship? If so, Intellectual Takeout has an opportunity for you.
We have plenty of work to do as well as ideas to spread, and we need your help to get it done.
If you're interested in an internship with Intellectual Takeout, you likely share our passion and you're excited about the possibility of working for a great cause. That said, you might have a few questions about what "...

The Association of American Educators (AAE) advances the teaching profession through personal growth, professional development, teacher advocacy and protection, as well as promoting excellence in education so that our members receive the respect, recognition and reward they deserve.

Are you concerned your child isn't getting the education necessary to compete in the global economy or even, perhaps, to carry on the lessons and learning of Western Civilization? If so, you have a number of choices. You could, of course, consider changing schools to a charter school, private school, or even homeschooling. If that's overwhelming for you right now, you can always supplement your...

Curiously, not a few individuals are realizing that their education (K-12 and even college) neglected to provide them with as much understanding of the world as they would like. At Intellectual Takeout, we believe that however you feel about your education, there is still much to be learned. To that end, we'd like to refer you to one book and a collection of "study guides" that serve as...

Sure, the idea of homeschooling is likely overwhelming. Indeed, homeschooling is a big commitment and a lot of work. That said, there's a reason why more and more parents are turning to homeschooling as the best option for their child(ren)'s education(s).
Perhaps you are starting to realize that the public school system has changed a lot since you last attended it. Maybe you can't afford private...

Let's face it, most of us love to watch TV and movies. A wonderful way to spread ideas is to embrace our love of the cinema by hosting a movie night with friends and family.
There are numerous documentaries that do a fantastic job of sharing the ideas of liberty. You can pull a small group of friends together at your house or even consider asking a local restaurant or tavern to let you...

Another movie that tells the story of the failing public school model in the United States is “The Lottery”. It takes its own unique look at the systems by focusing on the use of lotteries to choose which children will be plucked from failing public schools and put into more successful public charter schools.
Here’s the trailer:
You can watch the whole movie right now with the help of Hulu...

While there are a variety of really good documentaries about the failing public school systems in America, "The Cartel" stands alone in its frontal assault on the teacher unions, particularly those in New Jersey. If you'd like to get an inside look into how some teacher unions operate and the effects they have on education, you'll want to watch "The Cartel."From the movie's website: "This movie...

How often do you hear conservatives being called a bunch of knuckle-dragging Neanderthals?
Here's the reality: Conservatism, classical liberalism, and libertarianism have a rich, intellectual heritage reaching back many millennia. Our ideas are not just some historical relics from bygone eras; they are the very foundation of Western Civilization in general, amd the United States in particular....

When it comes to campus life injustices, student fees rank high on any list. On most campuses across the country a mandatory student fee is assessed to each student at the beginning of the year. A portion of this fee, which may be several hundred dollars, will go toward funding various political, religious, and interest groups.
A college requiring you to support groups espousing ideas which...

If
you're not happy with the direction of the country and you want to take
back your future, at some point you will have to do something. It's not
enough to just know that we're going in the wrong direction. You
actually have to step out and get involved.
Most college campuses have conservative and libertarian student
groups. Find one of them to join.
Below is a list of some of the larger non-...

Now that you're at college and the initial excitement has worn off, maybe you're thinking that the course selection is a bit biased and you'd like some options.
So how do you (the consumer) get the college (the business) to change up its offerings? It certainly won't be easy. Nevertheless it's something that should be done--particularly since you're footing the bill.
A good, education in a free...

Whatever activism you choose to do on campus, you need to get your story out. A popular tactic used by the Left is to isolate and intimidate freedom-loving students. You're not alone and there are a lot of people in your city, state, and country that can probably support your efforts. They just need to know what is happening.
Whenever you can, record in-class bias, discrimination against...

The reality is that most students (and people for that matter) won't speak out. It's called human nature and it was recognized in the Declaration of Independence: "...all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer,
while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the
forms to which they are accustomed."
While you might feel alone when debating a teacher,...

In the land of the free and the home of the brave, speech codes are a particularly odious example of politically correct repression on many a college campus. In some ways, college campuses are the least free places for thinking and speech in America.
Your best friend for fighting your school's repressive speech codes is the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). Here's a short clip...